Don’t Forget to Write

by Sara Goodman Confino

A pelican flew past me, diving for a fish it spotted, snagging it, and lifting up to soar again. I watched as it disappeared into the distance. It had never occurred to me to be jealous of a bird, but that pelican—minus the diet—had the freedom I wanted.

chastising

A pang of—something—hit me. I wasn’t ready to write that life off and be Ada. But I didn’t want it now either. And what I really needed was someone who understood and appreciated that.

That wasn’t Freddy. He never asked what I wanted to be or do because in his world, wife and mother was the be-all, end-all answer to that question for women. It never occurred to him that I might have a different answer.

Ada had said that social class was sometimes negotiable in making matches, but often not. And I finally understood she didn’t mean money. She meant values. Core beliefs. The way we treated others. ...

And she couldn’t care less whom Freddy married or how many children he fathered, as long as she got a front-row seat to any resulting dramatics.

And perhaps a touch of disappointment wasn’t such a bad thing to be able to write from experience.

But he had made his bed. And I had my own to make, unmake, and make again without him in it.

surreptitiously,

admonition

So I smiled every night when she left my room, giving another zinger to the sassy aunt in my story in her honor.

“We all have to make our own mistakes and learn some things the hard way.”

nebulous

Couples, young and old, strolled arm in arm. Women wore cocktail attire, and more than a handful of men wore tuxedoes despite the heat.

“Since when do you care what people think? Why not just be comfortable?” She suppressed a laugh. “I don’t, honestly. But everything here is an illusion. And if we don’t put on a show, why would anyone else?”

I kept my face neutral, though it was trying to scowl. She knew I wasn’t religious. But there were certain dictums of my childhood I wasn’t quite ready to abandon. Eating a lobster seemed awfully sacrilegious.

“The difference is etiquette. You can get away with a lot of things when you reach my age and stature, and you can get away with a lot when you’re young, but neither means you should.”

“Always say yes to new things,” Ada said. “It’s the only way you’ll be able to write about life—if you actually go out and live it.”

“You asked why I didn’t warn you off Freddy—that was part of why. You can’t expect to write about things you’ve never felt in a real way.”

vaudeville

We walked through the main bar, fitted in the Art Deco style of the 1920s, zebra-patterned wallpaper lining the walls.

“The 500 Club is proud to present to you tonight the Chairman of the Board, Old Blue Eyes himself, Mr. Frank Sinatra.”

“I don’t know most people. But if they’re regulars here, I’ve probably been introduced. I had much more of a social life when I was younger.”

The one who spent her days lost in books, but who doted on her children beyond anything. When she held us, did she think of the baby that never was? Did my father know? I thought of her weeping at her own mother’s death, the woman who protected her honor and allowed her to go on to become my mother instead of some fallen woman, which, in 1932, she would have been.

I looked at her profile, illuminated in the moonlight as she pulled off the Garden State onto Avalon Boulevard. She was wild and free, but she was alone.

From the perspective of a writer, it was a fascinating study. But none of them were my problem. I mentally wished them well and then put them entirely out of my head.

I was surprised at Ada wanting anonymity. She thrived on the recognition she received everywhere she went. Without it, I assumed she would shrivel up like a raisin.

Though I don’t see marriages going out of fashion anytime soon.”

“Because love alone won’t always make a good marriage.” She pushed her chair back from the table. “Enough questions for today. I have work to do.”

burgeoning

I threw my hands up, exasperated. “I don’t want to be saved.

“Do you have to have a comeback for everything I say?”

“I don’t want someone to stop me. I want someone who will respect that I made a choice and want to clean up my own mess.”

You’re—with other girls, I don’t know what they’re actually thinking. They say and do all the right things, and I never know what they really want. And you’re the exact opposite. You’re like a tiger. You might destroy me. And I kind of think that might be worth it.”

“This is what I mean though. I don’t know what you’re going to say or do. And I want to—I want to be here to hear it and see it and experience it all. I know we don’t really know each other yet, but I’m saying I want to.”

Bryn Mawr?”

“That right there,” I said, pointing at him. “That’s the problem. ‘I.’ I don’t want someone who solves problems for me. I want someone who lets me be an equal partner. And I know that may not exist, but if it doesn’t, I’m fine being like Ada and not being tied down.”

He had said all the right things. But there was a big difference between saying he liked me as I was and actually living it.

“She’s—she’s like me. She’s entirely who she is. And she lives exactly how

she wants to.” I thought for a moment. “I don’t know that I want to be alone my whole life, but she’s taught me that I don’t have to be like everyone else.”

sardonic,

But it’s—well—I suppose it’s a little like writing.” I tilted my head at that answer, sure he was about to prove he didn’t understand what I wanted to do. “I like being able to tell a story, just in images. There’s so much nuance to a good photograph. It can capture so much emotion, all by snapping the exact right moment and framing it correctly. You get to decide what to focus on and what to blur.”

“Meanwhile,” Ada continued, “I set that couple up six years ago now. So you’d best not tell the story of an unhappy marriage with that picture or that novel.”

I pouted a little. I didn’t like Lillian. She was already intruding on my time with Ada.

But before I even saw Lillian, I realized that Ada was smiling. Actually smiling.

yellow shirtwaist dress.

And she would never understand that she couldn’t upset me—at least not about Freddy. “That’s right. I hope they’re very happy.”

“We have nearly four more weeks until Labor Day,” Ada said crisply. “A lot can happen in four weeks. I don’t make plans that far in advance regardless.”

I didn’t want both a fiancé and my parents to die in order to live my own life the way Ada had.

Avalon?”